


Wulf

by skeletondance



Category: Fast and the Furious (2001)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Dubious Consent, First Time, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Werewolf Sex, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-12-27
Updated: 2012-12-27
Packaged: 2017-11-22 15:27:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/611319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skeletondance/pseuds/skeletondance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Werewolf fic) Dom is the alpha of his pack. He doesn't like discord between pack members, and it's becoming clear that Brian's arrival is creating too much friction with Vince. There's an old ritual used in werewolf packs to initiate new members and reaffirm status.</p><p>NB: unlikely to update any time soon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Werewolves in this universe don't shape-shift, they don't transform during the full moon, there's no biting of other people to make them into werewolves. The wolf exists on a psychic or spirit level, in the mind's eye  
> Timeline: picks up the day after Brian's break-in at Hector's

Vince's reflection stretches and warps along the quarter panel of the Supra as he sidles up behind Brian.

"How's it going, Spilner?"

Brian's kneeling, working on the edge of the wheel well with a hammer and dolly.

"Can't complain," Brian says. Vince is standing over him, feet planted wide, shoulders back, arms folded loose across his chest.

"That's right. You can't."

"Hey, Vince." Leon has straightened up from under the hood of the Duster he's working on. "How about you install the gauges on this like you been saying you're gonna." 

"In a minute," Vince says.

Brian bends to search through some sheet metal clamps on the floor next to him. Vince moves off, taking a slow turn around the Supra, keeping his arms folded, giving her a slow once-over. 

The radio drones from the back of the shop _You want me to forget…pretend we've never met…and I've tried and I've tried, but I haven't yet…_

"She's looking good," Vince says.

Brian tests along the metal of the wheel well with his thumb. He looks up again. Vince is loitering at the rear of the car, smiling, scratching his chin.

"Yeah," Vince says, like he's answering somebody. "You just better hope this car earns Dom his money back." 

He comes around to stand behind Brian. 

Brian can either ignore him or he can crane around to keep Vince in his eye line. He swaps the dolly he's using out for another one.

"'Cause you really can't afford to choke again," Vince says, still right behind him.

"Vince." Letty's in the office doorway. "Come on."

"That's what you said though, right?" Vince says. "You can't lose again. That is what you said."

Brian puts the stuff down and gets up and goes to the workbench, mops his hands off.

"There something you need, man?" he says.

Vince leans back against the car, his wallet chain clanking off the metal.

"Why, you offering?" He grins, his eyes cold, looking Brian up and down. "Shit. Think I'm starting to see why you're so freaked about losing another race."

" _Vince_ ," Letty barks.

Jesse's rolled out from under the Jetta, he watches, sitting on the creeper, his arms draped loose over his knees.

"Naw, we're cool, we're cool," Vince says. "I'm just goofin around with him."

"I think you'd better take it easy," Brian says mildly. He could be giving directions to the beach.

Vince laughs, claps his hands together once, then pushes himself away from the car. He steps up to Brian, coming slowly into his space. "Did I hit a nerve or something?"

Brian finishes cleaning his hands off. He tucks the cloth in the back pocket of his jeans. He keeps his eyes locked with Vince's.

Vince is still all smiles. "I bet you know a few ways to make money, huh?" he says quietly. His gaze flickers, taking in Brian's face. He moves another step closer. "With those baby blues of yours? I bet you're real popular. You should cash in, man. I bet you suck cock a whole lot better than you drive–"

Brian's body seems to make the decision before his brain does and he's smashing Vince up the chin with an uppercut before the words are all out of him. Vince takes it pretty good, steps back with it, comes lunging back for him, throwing both of them to the ground, landing a punch to Brian's gut on the way down.

Brian can hear the others yelling. Him and Vince roll over and over in a tangle on the floor, hitting at each other, their wolves are crashing together, snarling ugly noise. 

Vince lands a hit, shoves Brian back while he's off-balance and Brian goes into the tool chest. It makes a huge noise going over, the drawers smashing out onto the floor, disgorging trays of sockets, trays of wrenches, metal flashing spilling out.

Vince is on him, pins him, grabs him thick by the hair, whacks his skull back against the concrete.

"How you like that, you son of a bitch–"

Brian twists under him trying to buck him off. Vince keeps a hard hold, fingers fisted in his hair, smacks his head down again.

The impact's weird the second time, like Brian should feel it more but he doesn't. Somewhere he thinks about last night and getting clocked with the butt of Vince's shotgun, the scab on it felt okay when he checked this morning, felt like a pretty good bruise–

Someone's over Vince's shoulder, trying to haul him off. Brian sees a sweep of dark hair. Thinks it's Letty. A second later knows it's Mia. 

She's not supposed to be here.

Vince is oblivious. He jerks his arm back to swing and his fist, his elbow, something, catches her in the face.

The little shocked noise she makes as she stumbles back registers unnaturally loud for Brian and then it's white noise from there. He's on top of Vince. No memory of how he got there. He's just wailing on him, almost mechanical about it. Vince's body jolts and spasms under him each time he hits him. It feels good. Their wolves are in a tangle. Bloodlust. He searching out a weak point to sink his teeth in—

Something big smacks into Brian from behind.

A hand grabs a fistful of his t-shirt between his shoulder blades, yanking, another hand clamping around his arm. He's hauled up and tossed sideways like he weighs nothing. 

He hits the side of the Supra hard, sprawls, no time to recover, there's a heavy body on top of him, a big wolf's jaws around his wolf's throat. It's the work of a second. He's down. Dom's broad hand is clamped around his neck, choking him off. 

Brian struggles, body and mind, even knowing instinctively there's no getting out from under this. He tries to pull in a breath and he can't. Dom's face is closed off, rigid with fury above him.

Brian thinks there's voices shouting. It's like hearing underwater.

It's reflexive to keep fighting it, but he's getting weak fast. He can't breathe. His hands grab at the solid muscle of Dom's arm. His wolf squirms on its back under Dom's. He can't breathe. He can't breathe.

There's only Dom. His presence dominates, blots everything else out. That deep, incessant snarling that sounds like murder coming down a tunnel for Brian. Brian can hear his own wolf underneath it, making noise that's so freaked out he almost can't believe it's him.

His lungs are starving. His face is aching horribly, capillaries in his cheeks throbbing with blood, even blinking hurts, like his eyelids are swollen.

His grip is loose on Dom's arm.

His wolf, in his mind's eye, still on its back thrashing, arching its head to give his neck into Dom's jaws, whatever Dom wants, just trying desperately over and over to transmit the same message–

_No threat. I submit. No threat. I submit._

The clamp of Dom's hand on his windpipe stays unyielding as a band of steel.

 _What do you want me to do?_ The thought bubbles up in Brian's head, hopeless. Throb of blood in his ears. Black spotting his vision. He's going to pass out.

Dom jerks his hand away.

Brian sucks air and rolls onto his side and hacks and gulps, shoulders shaking, he chokes on air he's trying to gulp it down so fast. 

The cement's cool and gritty against his burning cheek. His eyes are streaming. He coughs wet, hacking, breathes and breathes and coughs.

The sounds of the garage come back. Mia's voice.

"–said I'm _fine_! For Christ's sake, Dom!"

Brian forces himself to roll onto his back again, instinct telling him that's the safest place for him right now. 

Dom's standing away from him.

The others are close. The vibe is bad all around. That too-quiet when people don't know what to do next. There's heavy breathing. Stink of anxiety coming off all of them. Brian can smell Mia's blood.

He chances a quick look. She's standing with Letty. Her hand is covering her mouth where she's bleeding.

"I'm fine," she says again, speaking quieter now. "It's just a split lip, Dom, okay? I'm fine."

Dom's fists are clenched, his shoulders rounded. He's like a bull, the power resonating from him looks just barely contained. 

There's quiet. Just Brian's ragged huffing and a lot of quiet.

Dom looks down at him. His face is tight.

"Did you hit her?"

Brian gives a slight shake of his head. He puts his jaws together, swallows, breathes through his nose, trying to be quieter that way, his chest still heaving.

Dom's dark eyes move off him and it feels like the weight of a barbell being taken off his chest.

Dom turns slowly, rounding on Vince where he's crouched near the wreck of tools and the overturned chest. Vince is already holding up his hand, palm-out: _peace_.

"It was an accident, Dom," Mia snaps.

"It just got outta hand, man," Vince says. "She came up behind me, I didn't see her."

Dom doesn't say anything. They're all watching him, waiting. After a moment he looks past Mia, to Letty.

"Go get her cleaned up."

"Dom–" Mia says.

Letty takes her by the arm and pulls her along. Mia tries to stop as they pass Brian. He doesn't lift his eyes to her, doesn't dare.

"Come on." Letty nudges her on. Brian listens to the scuff of their feet as they go into the back.

He tenses up as Dom looks down at him again.

"You need to be someplace else."

Brian blinks stupidly. He hears the words and he understands the command, but still he can't seem to come unfrozen. His wolf is telling him to keep small and flat to the ground, keep still.

"Now," Dom says.

Brian snaps out of it. He scrambles awkwardly into a sitting position, puts his hand on the side of the car to push himself up, his palm sweat-slick, squeaking on the metal.

"It wasn't even Brian started it, man." Jesse's voice is high-strung and wobbly.

"Chill, Jesse," Leon says.

Brian wipes at his face quickly with the back of his arm. He does his best to walk normally as he passes Dom, keeps his eyes down, goes blinking out into the light of the yard. He climbs up into Harry's truck and gets the engine going and pulls out.

The radio comes on with the engine but he doesn't hear it until he's a good mile down the strip. He puts his hand up to rub his neck. The skin is hot and tender. His hand is shaking. He grips the bow of the steering wheel and keeps driving.

~*~

He pulls in at Harry's. He's driven himself there on autopilot. He sits with the engine idling, finally cuts it. His t-shirt's sticking to him with sweat. He wipes his forehead and mouth on the sleeve and then gets out the truck.

He's almost at the front entrance before he catches sight of himself in the glass and pulls up short. He's a mess. Second time he's shown up to Harry's looking like this—but this time he's got blood dried on the back his neck. He hadn't noticed. He feels the back of his head where the hair is sticky. His fingers come away with blood on them.

A guy comes out of the store and Brian drops his hand quickly. He recognizes the guy, one of Hector's, and more behind him. Brian turns and makes to go round the side of the store.

"Hey yo, Brian," someone shouts after him. 

He stops. Looks back. Hector's spotted him.

"What's up, man."

"Shit, homes." Hector looks him over. "What happened to you?"

"Nothing, it's cool." Brian wipes at the side of his neck and immediately regrets it, wipes his hand on the seat of his pants.

Hector's crew gather out on the sidewalk. A few of them move off to lean against their cars, throwing Brian speculative looks.

"You in trouble, man?" Hector says quietly. His eyes flicker past Brian's shoulder, squinting against the sun. "You want one of my guys to run you over to Dominic's?"

"Nah, I'm good," Brian says stiffly. "Thanks."

The door opens and a couple of Harry's guys come out wheeling a pallet truck between them loaded high with gear. Harry holds the door behind them. His eyes settle on Brian and his face goes slack.

"Harry, sorry," Brian says before he can get the wrong idea, "I was going to go round the back."

"What—what's going on?" Harry glances around at Hector's guys, back at Brian, he reaches blindly behind him for the doorframe, telegraphing his unease.

"Yeah, I'm sorry, I'll go get cleaned up," Brian says, talking fast. He jerks a thumb over his shoulder. "I was just heading round back now."

"Yeah… Yeah, well" Harry catches on belatedly and takes a second to shift gears. "You can't show up here looking like this." He nods towards Hector. "Customers don't need to be seeing this. You represent me. What the hell are you trying to do?"

Brian shifts his weight like he's embarrassed. "I'll get cleaned up."

"I don't want to see you in the front until you do," Harry says. He shakes his head and walks quickly back into the store.

"Shit," Hector grunts. "You aint catchin a break today, huh, homes?"

Brian shrugs, playing it off.

Harry's guys are unloading the trolley, passing parts off onto Hector's boys.

Hector rubs his hands together contemplatively. "You gotta work? I mean, you wanna come for a drink? We got our parts, we celebrating."

Brian cracks a smile. "Nah, I can't. Can't do it."

"You can't do it?"

"I need this job, man."

Hector bobs his head. "Alright." 

They clap hands, Brian covers his surprise as Hector pulls him in, slaps him once on the back.

~*~

He leans over the sink in the back room washing his face, the dried blood on his neck. He bends and greedily sucks down handfuls of water. He wets a towel and mops gingerly at the back of his skull, has a feel with his fingers and decides it's not bad, just the scab opened up, it's not bleeding much now.

He checks out his neck in the mirror. The imprints left by Dom's fingers and thumb are red either side of his throat. He braces his hands on the edge of the sink and looks himself in the eye. His face is still dripping water. He draws in a slow breath, releases it, blowing out his cheeks. He wonders if he's just fucked everything up.

~*~

He doesn't check in with Tanner the next morning like he knows he should.

Harry shows up at eight, doesn't ask him about anything, doesn't want to know, just hands off a list of parts for the day. Brian helps open up like usual, does the shutters on the display cases, shoots the shit with one of Harry's guys while they boot up the computers.

He spends a half hour loading up the truck in the alley. A lorry pulls up in front of the store as he's finishing and soon after Harry appears at the mouth of the alley, taps his clipboard on the truck's wing mirror.

"A lot of this stuff just come in is for Toretto."

"I'll come back for it," Brian says.

~*~

He's checking in the rearview all morning, half-expecting Tanner to flag him down, kind of hoping for it, but it doesn't happen.

Three o'clock he's back at Harry's for the second load. He drags his feet making the last deliveries, edgy the whole time, shifting in his seat while he drives, tapping his thumb on the wheel, checking and re-checking the time, wondering how long he should leave things.

It's four when he finally works his way round to the garage.

He sweeps a quick glance around the yard as he pulls in. No sign of Dom's car. He gets out and goes round the back of the truck, takes the tailgate down. He pulls out what looks like a supercharger, swaddled in bubble wrap, and heads for the bay doors with it under his arm, clipboard in hand.

Leon's leaning against the Duster, mopping grease off his hands.

"You done for the day?"

Brian nods. "Another order came in for you guys."

"Oh yeah?" Leon comes out to sign for it. He glances at Brian's neck as he hands the clipboard back.

"Where do you want it?" Brian says.

"Ah, it's all Jesse's shit. Dump it over here."

Brian puts the package down on the bench by the Jetta and heads back out to the truck. Leon comes with him, opens his hands, signaling for Brian to pass him something. They work together in silence unloading the lot.

"This stuff come from Europe?" Leon says, reading off a label.

"Looks like it." 

Brian finds his eyes drawn to the doorway of Dom's office. It's quiet in the shop apart from the radio. He wants to ask Leon where everyone's at. He sets down the package he's carrying and goes back out into the yard. There's only a set of struts left. Him and Leon lift the container down between them.

"You know, that stuff with Vince and Mia," Leon says, out the blue as they're walking it back. "Been going on since they were kids."

Brian checks over his shoulder so he won't catch his foot.

"Oh yeah?" he says, his voice flat.

"You been in a pack before?" Leon says. They squat and put the box down.

Brian straightens up and rubs his elbow. Leon feels his pockets for his cigarettes. They stand looking at the pile of gear.

"You just come right out and ask something like that?" Brian says.

"What, you all old school about that shit?"

Brian goes to close up the truck. Leon follows after him, hands cupped to his mouth as he snaps his lighter.

Brian leans into the bed of the truck, catching up stray bits of tape and plastic, clearing them aside.

"I don't know how you do things," Leon says, "you personally. But in this pack here? We got our own ways. You might want to try harder to blend, know what I'm sayin?"

Brian closes up the tailgate.

"I owe Dom," he says, looking the truck over. "I'm here until he says I'm paid up. I'm not trying to make any shit for him."

"And Mia?"

Brian looks out across the yard.

"You go against Dom over Mia, he'll rip your throat out."

"Dom tells me to stay away, I'll stay away," Brian says tersely.

Leon nods, pulls on his cigarette. He looks sideways at Brian. "So you have been in a pack before."

There's a rumble of a performance engine and moments later Letty's Silvia swings into the yard, dust kicking up off the gravel under the tires.

"I was starting to think you guys had eloped," Leon calls as Letty and Jesse climb out. Brian finds himself looking the car over warily, but there's no sign of Vince.

Letty nudges the driver door closed, her eyes unreadable behind her shades as she looks Brian's way. She heads into the garage. 

"Hey, Brian." Jesse's laden down with three burgers wrapped in grease paper, two fries and two large soda. He deposits the lot on the workbench by the door, turns and feigns tossing one of the burgers Leon's way.

"Head's up."

"'Ey, no, easy with the goods." Leon moves quick, crossing the yard and swiping the burger off him.

"What's all this?" Letty says, hunkering down to look through the stack of packages.

"Delivery came in," Leon says.

"My charge cooler better be in here, I've been waiting three goddamn months." Letty holds up a package, scrutinizing the label. "Jesse, man, you're gonna cream yourself."

Brian goes to lean in the doorway, folding his arms. He watches as Letty and Jesse start tearing into the gear.

"So," Letty says casually, glancing up at Brian. "Puppy came back, huh?"

Leon cracks up at that, he's just taken a bite of burger and he puts his fist to his mouth and turns away.

"What'd you call me?" Brian says.

Letty stays crouched with the package, runs her tongue over her teeth, fighting off a grin.

"Aw man," Jesse breathes, "this is…a thing of beauty, just look at that crankshaft, look at it." He lifts the part reverently out of its wrapping like he's just unearthed a holy artifact.

Another car rolls up in the yard. Brian straightens and turns sharply, relaxes some as he sees it's Mia's blue Integra.

The garage goes noticeably quiet behind Brian. He watches as Mia gets out. She's wearing a short summer dress, her hair loose. Her top lip's swollen up, the split small and red. She takes her sunglasses off as she comes around the car, stops in front of Brian.

"Hey."

"Hey."

She glances past his shoulder, then back at him.

"Can I talk to you?"

Brian goes into the yard with her. They stand over by the truck.

"Are you okay?" she says.

"Yeah." Brian brushes his knuckle under her chin, looking at her lip. "How about you?"

She pushes his hand away and tucks her hair behind her ear.

"So," she says, trying for easy, "are we were still on for tonight?"

"Tonight." Brian drops his head, his neck aching a little with the sudden movement. "Uh." He looks at her again, trying to think of the best way to do this.

"Yeah," Mia says. "Jesus. Okay." She's expecting it, doesn't make her any less pissed off. She smiles mirthlessly, shaking her head. " _This_ is why I don't date my brother's friends. Always the same shit."

"I just think—" Brian reaches for her wrist. "Maybe if we waited…"

"I get it." She turns away and starts back to her car.

"Mia."

"I'll see you around, Brian." She climbs in, pulling the door shut after her with a crisp clunk.

Brian steps back as she reverses out. He stands looking for a while after she's gone.

He goes back into the garage and Letty and Jesse are still kneeling on the floor sorting through parts, their heads bent, a little too studied about it. 

Leon's sitting on the workbench eating. Brian catches his eye as he passes. 

None of them venture to comment, which Brian's grateful for. He picks up a tool tray. All the mess from yesterday has been cleaned away like it never happened, the tool chest standing back neat against the far wall. 

Brian goes and squats down next to the Supra, letting out a quiet breath as he takes a look at the big dent in the door.

~*~

He's on his back under the car when Dom gets in. He hears his car in the yard, the sound of the car door, Dom's tread on the gravel.

He very determinedly keeps working his socket wrench, turning the bolts on the transmission pan. He doesn't give into the nervous impulse telling him to get out from under the car immediately. The hairs on his arms are standing on end, he's got gooseflesh all of a sudden.

"Rest of the parts came," Letty calls from the yard.

"So I see," Dom says, his voice close.

Brian finishes tightening up the last mounting bolt, his hands seeming clumsy all of a sudden. He slides out from under the car. Dom is standing nearby, a can of soda in his hand, his outline bold against the orange sky out the doorway.

"Putting the pan back on?"

"Yup." Brian drops his wrench in the socket tray.

Dom nods. He gestures towards the office with his can. "Let's go in the back."

He stands waiting while Brian sits up on the creeper, cleans off his hands. He leads the way into the office, goes and leans against the desk, resting his soda can on his knee.

"You gonna come in?" he says, a small smile tugging at his mouth.

Brian blinks, realises he's stopped just inside the doorway. On some level, his wolf is still warning him to mind his proximity after yesterday. 

He steps inside the room, ducking his head to cover his embarrassment.

"Hector told me he ran into you outside of Harry's," Dom says.

Brian nods.

"Harry chew you out?"

"Uh, yeah, some," Brian says. There's a pause where Dom doesn't say anything, just watches him. Brian folds his arms to keep from moving his hands around restlessly. "I don't think I'm exactly making a great impression on him."

Dom tilts his head. "He still ain't fired you."

"Right." Brian offers up a smile, looking up at Dom from under his brows, meeting his eye, finally finding the nerve.

Another pause. They consider one another.

"Let me take a look at that," Dom says at last, his eyes on Brian's neck.

"It's fine, man."

"I'd like to take a look."

Brian shifts his weight between his feet, then shrugs. "Guess I'm not gonna stop you."

He stands immobile as Dom puts his soda down, pushes himself off the desk, comes towards him. 

Dom touches his throat carefully, with both hands, his fingers light, cool from the cold soda can.

"Hurt?" Dom says.

"Nah."

Dom looks at the bruising some more.

"I can't have any more of this shit with you and Vince," he says quietly, stepping back.

"I'm not the one with the problem."

"Oh really?" Dom raises his eyebrows. "You want a place around here?" He indicates himself, the office, the garage. "It's your problem."

Brian's mind goes blank. He opens his mouth, closes it again.

Dom turns to get his soda. He takes a slow swig, his eyes hooded as he continues to regard Brian.

"That shut you up," he says at length.

"If you want me to talk to Vince–"

"I don't want you to talk to Vince." Dom turns away, his back to Brian, he seems to be considering the chaos of papers stuck up on the marker board behind the desk. "You know, I've been debating what to do with you."

"Is that right," Brian says, as unaffected as he can manage.

"Yeah."

"You make a decision?"

Dom rubs his hand over the back of his head. He moves slowly around to face Brian. 

"Where's your home?"

"What?"

"Simple question."

"You want an address?" Brian huffs a quick breath of laughter. "Or, what, like some philosophical bullshit answer? Come on, man."

"Where's your _home_ , Brian? Where are your people?"

"I do alright on my own."

Dom's gaze is steady, for a moment it's like he's stripping through Brian, like he knows the whole deal, everything, so Brian has to look away, remind himself he's walking a tightrope with no fucking net here.

"I'm not trying to make trouble for you," Brian says. "You know I'm an earner. I'll win you your money back." 

Dom's still not saying anything.

Brian gestures over his shoulder. "I'll go down to Riverside tonight, they've been saying at Harry's there's a race on."

"Whose car do you plan on driving?"

"You'd have to lend me one—" Brian falters. There's a glint in Dom's eye that could be amusement, or something else.

"Do you think I'm cutting you loose?" Dom says.

Brian shrugs, doing everything to project a relaxed demeanor, like he's unconcerned either way. His heart's thumping. The situation's slipped out of his grasp at some point, probably when he set foot in the office.

"Shrug your shoulders, that's all you've gotta say?" Dom imitates him, throwing out his chest a little, hands open at his sides, the whole pose radiating _I could give a shit_.

"You put me in a race, I'll win for you," Brian says, allowing some of the frustration and mounting desperation he's feeling to come into his voice.

"This aint about racing, it aint about the money. I want to know what you want."

"I don't want anything," Brian says at once, reflexively. Dom presses his lips in a line of displeasure, shaking his head slowly. He points at Brian, at his chest.

"Don't bullshit me. You think I can't read him?" _Him._ He means the wolf.

Brian feels himself flush hot. His mind works furiously, trying to find the right thing to say, the thing Dom wants to hear. Dom just watches him, waits.

"I know what you want," Dom says finally. "Wolf doesn't lie."

Brian swallows, his mouth suddenly dry. He wants to move away from Dom, retreat a step, put some space between them.

"I don't know what you're talking about, man," he says.

Dom's dark eyes flash dangerously, his mouth twisting down. "Fine." He nods past Brian's shoulder. "Go finish up that transmission. Have it done by closing." He turns his back on Brian, dismissing him.

Brian loosens out of his stiff stance in surprise. "What, is that it?"

Dom turns back around. "You're here to work in the shop? Go work in the shop." 

Brian doesn't move.

"One thing I can't stand, it's bullshit," Dom says. "You be real with me or you go get back to work."

"I'm not trying to make trouble for your pack." Brian can't tell from Dom's expression if what he's saying is making things better or worse. "What you're doing, trusting me like this, letting me in, I never—" Brian cuts himself off.

"What?" Dom comes towards him.

"Nothing."

"Say what you were gonna say." Dom's wolf is suddenly there, large and still, appearing at the edge of Brian's awareness. It catches Brian off-guard and his wolf startles, crouching back. It happens fast before he can cover it.

Brian turns his head aside in embarrassment. "Sorry," he mutters. 

When he chances a look again, Dom's studying him, his expression softened.

"Can't say I blame you," Dom murmurs. The wolf is gone, and Brian is alone again. Dom's not the kind of guy to make a big deal of it, and he moves past Brian, goes to the door. "Come on," he says quietly, all the heat gone out of him. "I want to show you something."

~*~

He takes Brian to the house, to see the Charger.

He drops him back at the garage after, as evening's coming on. They've gone most of the drive in silence, Brian staring unseeing out the window as the neighborhood slides by, his thoughts still back at the garage, still with the black terrible lurking presence of the Charger, the newspaper cuttings of Dom's father on the wall.

They pull into the yard and Dom brings the car around, parks and turns the engine off. The car ticks softly and Brian pulls off his seatbelt and then sits and doesn't get out.

"The way this thing works," Dom says quietly, looking ahead, his hands curled loose on the steering wheel "you gotta come to me. If that's what you're still looking for." He passes his hand down the bow of the wheel, rests his arm on the doorframe. "You know about me now."

Brian's breath's coming thin, his chest feels too-tight. Dom looks ahead, impassive. 

"You understand what I'm saying, Brian?"

Brian goes to where he's parked Harry's truck and gets in. He rumbles out the gate, looking back in the rearview mirror at Dom's car still parked behind, lamp light awash across the windshield so he can't make out Dom through the glass.

~*~


	2. Chapter 2

"'You think'?" Bilkins sits forward in his chair. "Either he did or he didn't. What exactly did Toretto say?"

"Where's Tanner?" Brian says.

"I already told you—"

"Well when's he gonna get here?" Brian turns. Paces to the windows. He braces his hands on the sill and stands leaning with his forehead close to the glass, his body held tense. 

"You're testing my patience, O'Conner," Bilkins says.

Brian pushes away from the window, crosses in front of Bilkins' desk, pacing the office like its a cage.

Muse is leaning in the doorway drinking coffee, out of Brian's way.

"Now either Toretto extended an invitation or he didn't, which is it?"

"I don't know." Brian rubs his neck, rubs his jaw. "This was never supposed to be a part of it. Tanner said— He told me that wasn't what this was—"

"Just calm down." Bilkins points to one of the two empty chairs in front of the desk. "Sit."

Brian drops down into the chair, sits hunched forward, fingers laced, hands clasped tight together in front of his mouth.

"Alright." Bilkins draws a steadying breath. "If I'm understanding you, what we're looking at here is a major breakthrough. You know what a position that close to Toretto would mean to this investigation."

Brian shakes his head, pressing his knuckles against his mouth.

"You get inside, Toretto's not going to keep anything back from you. You get in, we have this case wrapped up in a matter of hours."

"Can't do it."

Bilkins throws his pen down on the stack of papers in front of him. "You need me to remind you what your job is?"

"This was never the job." Brian shoves to his feet again and carries himself mindlessly back to the window. The world is black and orange out the glass, sickly glow of light pollution, the webbing of far-off lights from the city beaded and winking, Brian's reflection frowning back at him, repeated twice in the double glazing. 

"You don't know what you're asking me to do."

Bilkins goes still. "I don't know? _I_ don't know?" He gets to his feet, knocking a pencil cup over and sending some loose sheets of paper on the edge of the desk flopping to the floor. Muse comes in and puts his coffee mug on the desk, bends to pick the papers up. Human. Oblivious.

Brian keeps looking out the window, won't look at Bilkins, his disdain will be too obvious. 

Bilkins might be Wolf, but you wouldn't know it to look at him, he keeps it leashed so tight.

Brian makes fists of his hands on the windowsill. "Tanner told me—"

"Who's running this investigation?" Bilkins comes out from behind the desk. Brian doesn't move to acknowledge him.

"Why do you think you were selected?" Bilkins says, standing at his shoulder. "You, when we had more experienced UCs we could have gone with." 

Brian shakes his head silently.

"If you have an opportunity to join Toretto's pack," Bilkins says, his voice rising, "you _will_ take it. Or god help me, I will pull you out of this thing right now. You knew this was the job—"

"Nah," Brian mutters. "No way."

"—you came in with full understanding of the commitment required of you—"

"I need" Brian's voice is remarkably controlled to his own ears "to talk to Tanner."

“You think I don't know my own business, son?” Bilkins’ eyes bulge slightly. He gets his face close to Brian’s face. Brian’s wolf feels it, doesn’t like it, feels Bilkins’ wolf though he can’t see it. His hackles start up, but if Bilkins sees it, he gives no sign.

“You join that pack,” Bilkins says quietly. “You stay in deep and you stay in as long as I tell you to. We find out who’s been jacking those trucks.” He waits for Brian to meet his eye before backing off. “You wanted to win Toretto’s confidence? Here’s your chance, on a goddamn silver platter.”

~*~

There're only a couple of lights on in the house, one upstairs, one at the back of the house, the kitchen, the low glow of it comes through the curtains in the front room. It's after one AM.

Brian's pacing on the sidewalk for long minutes, looking up at the house, before he finally talks himself into going up the path.

He knocks on the frame of the screen door. Stands back and waits, pushing his hands into his jeans pockets, forcing himself to stand still.

It's dark in the hall behind Dom when he opens the door.

"It's late, sorry," Brian says in a rush.

Dom's barefoot, dressed in a tank top and sweats, he's calm, alert.

"You okay?"

Dread stirs in Brian. Standing on the dark porch, the other man's gaze heavy on him, he's not sure how it's come to this.

Some of the blank terror must be showing on his face because Dom's pushing the door open wider, saying quietly, "Come on, come inside."

A voice comes from behind Dom, inside the house—

"What's going on?"

Dom turns, his face falling into shadow. "It's okay, Mia, go back to bed."

Brian sees the shift of muscle across Dom's back and his shoulder as he reaches for something inside the doorway, he hears the soft clink of keys. Dom bends and gets his boots and sets them down on the floorboards of the porch. He steps into them and shuts the door behind him.

"Come on."

Brian follows him around the side of the house. Dom opens up the garage and goes in and turns on an old inspection lamp hanging on a hook over the workbench. He hauls the door closed while Brian stands awkwardly by. Then he goes and leans against the workbench. He doesn't say a word.

Brian looks ahead at the Charger. That feels safe.

He takes a slow circle around the car, keeping his eyes down. The light twists and splits running like liquid over the hard lines of the machine. The back of his neck prickles as he feels Dom watching him.

He knows he should say something. Explain himself. Start making his excuses if he's going to back out of this now.

His tongue feels thick in his mouth.

The silence in the garage is starting to feel unbearable.

It's like his body is moving on its own as he goes over to the workbench. He puts his hand out and grips the bench like to stop himself. Instinct is tugging at him with a strength he's never experienced.

He shudders as his wolf pulls to go on. It pulls like it's at the end of an invisible chain, the rest of the chain straight through Brian's navel and bound up in his innards. The force of the compulsion is unnerving. The line lurches and tugs, dancing and pulling, making Brian weak and hot-cold.

He goes to Dom, ducks his head and presses his face to Dom's neck. 

His wolf presses to Dom's, small and submissive, crouched close to the ground. Heat and power resonate from the alpha. Brian has no control, his wolf is guided by sheer instinct, rubbing its muzzle under Dom's jaw, butting and rubbing into the thick grey fur of the alpha's neck.

Brian's eyes are tight closed. He's dropped his head at some point, his shoulders curved, his nose mashed against Dom's collar bone, and Dom's hand is holding the nape of his neck firmly, his thumb rubbing slow behind Brian's ear.

"Alright," Dom's voice rumbles low. "You're alright, Brian." 

Dom walks him back slowly, hand on his elbow, hand on his ribs, backing him up, Brian stumbling a little, his legs gone leaden. Dom puts him against the car, cool metal against Brian's back, Brian throws his arm out clumsily, his watch clips the window.

Dom's hand on his belly, just for a moment, it's happening fast. Dom's hand in Brian's hair, he's guiding Brian's head with a sure hand, not forceful about it, but the touch triggers memory like a flashbulb popping–

_–boyfriend of his mom's, flaming skulls tattoo on his thick forearm, the guy's dragging Brian into the house from the yard with a mean grip, throws him against the wall in the kitchen, pinning him roughly, knocking the phone off the wall, it breaks hitting the floor, strip of plastic spinning away, guy's breath stinks of whiskey, his weight's crushing Brian's arm across his chest, Brian must be about fourteen, the guy's hand is balled in his hair, forcing his head back, forcing submission, mom's screaming something she's trying to get between them-_

"Hey," Dom says, his face close to Brian's, his dark eyes fixed on him. "You okay?"

Brian stares back at him in shock, his breathing gone choppy. Dom's hand rests warm and steadying on the side of Brian's neck. 

Dom's got this assessing look like he might be about to stop the whole thing right there. 

Brian swallows and calms down, just calm the fuck down.

"Yeah," he says. "I'm good, I'm okay." He straightens a little against the car, tips his chin up, showing Dom his neck, unambiguous.

Dom's eyes linger as he looks at his bared neck. He meets Brian's eye a final time before he's leaning in. He puts his nose to Brian's neck. Brian jerks at the feeling of it, the intimacy of it. He grabs at Dom's arm, feels the defined muscle warm under his hand. He feels enveloped, like he's being swallowed up. Dom's smelling him, pulling in deep, slow breaths, letting them out hot against Brian's jugular, takes his time about it, patient, like he's letting Brian get used to him.

He noses under Brian's jaw, down the crook of Brian's neck, rubbing with mouth and nose and chin. Brian's eyes keep falling closed. His head's feeling heavy so he lets his skull tip back, rest on the car. Dom cradles his head in both hands and scents him possessively.

Brian's wolf makes a wavering anxious noise as it goes down, laying down on its side and then slowly on its back. Dom's wolf moves over him and a pulse of terror mingled with exhilaration blooms up in Brian.

"That's it," Dom mutters, his voice a little rough. "That's good."

Dom turns Brian's head and puts Brian's face into his neck again so that Brian can smell him in return. Brian's breathing fast and the scent off Dom's skin here is rich, potent, quickly filling his senses, this clean male smell of flesh and sweat, and the flavor that's unique to Dom. He breathes greedily, loud through his nose, nostrils pressed close to Dom's skin. He feels drunk and keeps taking in more.

His wolf lies on its back, exposing its belly and throat, and Dom's wolf smells and growls softly. The ritual is ancient, bone-deep. It's instinctive and all too easy to follow, go where Dom leads.

Brian comes back to himself slumped against the car, slipping down, but Dom's body keeps him pinned in place. Some emotion lurches and skitters in Brian and he starts to struggle in fitful movements. He wrestles a little against Dom, confused, flexing and twisting against the car, so Dom pins him more firmly and they're both breathing hard, looking at each other.

"This is what you want?" Dom says, his eyes flickering to Brian's neck, the place he's going to bite.

The air is thickly perfumed with their scents. Brian's head is reeling.

He holds onto Dom's shoulders, pushing a little against them, as his wolf is squirming fitfully under Dom's.

"Tell me," Dom murmurs, dipping his head again and putting his mouth to Brian's throat. He brushes his mouth and his chin over the point, lightly, but it sends a roiling shock through Brian's whole body.

"Dom," Brian grunts, his voice slurring slightly.

"Do you want this?" Dom says against his neck.

Brian nods jerkily.

"Let me hear it," Dom says.

"Yeah."

Dom draws back, takes Brian's arm and motions for him to come away from the car. Brian straightens up only to sway back and grab for the roof of the car as the floor seems to move under his feet.

"Oh man," he mutters. He feels shitfaced.

Dom shepherds him to the back of the garage, there's a beat-up old couch against the wall.

"I don't feel good," Brian says thickly, the words running together a little, and it's not exactly true, he's not feeling bad—

"I got you." Dom clears some papers off the couch and then lowers Brian down. "It won't last long. Lie back." He's got his hand on Brian's shoulder.

"Dom—" Brian tries to resist it, but he's gone slow, everything dulled, his limbs weak and heavy. He leans up and rubs his mouth and nose under Dom's jaw, trying to placate him.

"I got you," Dom says again, his fingers sinking in Brian's hair, making him shiver. "It's alright." He holds the base of Brian's skull, his other hand on his chest, guiding him down.

Brian sinks back on the couch cushions and arches his neck, feeling hot all over.

"That's it." Dom leans over him and noses at his throat. "Just relax."

His mouth settles against the nerve point at Brian's neck and his lips part. He sets his teeth there, sending a jolt through Brian, and then it's wet and very hot as he seals his mouth over Brian's flesh and the slippery aching pull begins.

Brian is thrown into his wolf. Dom's wolf is on top of him. His jaws are locked at Brian's neck and it's nothing at all like yesterday. It's some strange kind of bliss, oblivion, to be held down, in his place, pinned with no option to struggle. He succumbs to the power over him and it feels like being held, bound up secure and safe, and Dom's smell and the feeling of him, the absolute power and potency of him, battering Brian into a new shape, blissful wave after wave beating over him.

Brian comes back to himself bit by bit, with no sense of how long he's been out. The pressing darkness that had fallen over his vision seeps away and he's staring up at the wooden struts and plywood of the garage roof.

His consciousness is focused at the nerve point at his neck, throbbing and tender, Dom's mouth still over it. 

There's a low, dull ache that runs from the mark right through Brian's body. The slow swipe of Dom's hot tongue makes Brian sigh thickly, makes his eyes blink drowsily shut once more. He pushes his head back into the cushion, arching slightly, languid in abandon. He can hear Dom's wolf growling low, satisfied, and the sound thrums through him like he's a bell being softly struck, over and over. It's enough to push his towards sleep.

Then Dom's mouth leaves his neck. Dom's hand is there, touching the tender skin lightly, where Dom's mouth has left warm saliva, and the flesh is bruised hot with the blood drawn to the surface.

Brian blinks his eyes open slowly. Dom is looking down at him, saying something to him, the words don't penetrate the fog of Brian's mind, but the low soothing tone of it is enough to tell him everything's okay.

Dom's pulling away, standing up. A whine escapes Brian's wolf and he tries to sit up. Some submerged part of him is unnerved by how stoned he's feeling, really out of it, the world feels like it's trying to tip onto its side, he can't find his center of balance.

Dom's hand on his shoulder, pushing him down. He goes easily. Dom's face above him, his lips moving again, the rumbling calm tone of his voice making Brian relax and lie still.

 _"When does it stop?"_ Brian tries to say. He can't tell how successful he is in even forming the words, he just hears disconnected noises and feels the vibration in his throat, and again he's dimly disturbed.

Dom's hand rests warm against his cheek. Brian holds his gaze drowsily, his eyelids getting heavier with each blink. A great tiredness is settling over him.

 _"Sleep,"_ Dom says, the tone of command in it, and Brian hears it clearly in his mind. 

He shuts his eyes to blackness and he's swept away.

He wakes again, no sense of time having passed, utterly disoriented, Dom's voice saying his name, Dom's touch at his elbow, rocking him.

He's thrown his arm across his eyes at some point while he slept.

He twists on the couch and nearly tips off it, but Dom catches him.

His brain still feels like it's slopping around inside his skull, the space between time as it's unfolding and his perception of it still unnervingly out of whack, the lag of a half a second, very like being drunk.

"How we doin?" Dom murmurs, squatting beside the couch, looking into Brian's face.

Brian's flesh prickles and his senses flare into life suddenly—telling him there's danger, there's someone else here. He pushes up onto his elbow and sees the garage door standing open and knows without knowing how that the someone is out there, in the dark, and if they come in, he'll have no way of defending himself, not while he's like this.

"Hey, hey," Dom says. Brian snaps out of it instantly, focusing his attention on the alpha.

"Someone's there," Brian says, and it comes out rough but at least intelligible.

"I know." Dom puts his hand to Brian's throat, over the mark, and Brian feels it warm right through him. He holds onto Dom's forearm while he blinks to try and keep his eyes open. Everything feels good like this, like a weight being taken off him, like he's really feeling his body for the first time, the weight of his limbs all lax and pleasantly weary, the sweet expand and release of his ribs as he breathes, his lungs fill and empty. The small strand of worry about the presence outside the garage narrows to nearly nothing.

"You gotta do what I say now, Brian, you understand?" Dom murmurs.

"Yeah," Brian grunts.

Dom looks back over his shoulder, nods to whoever it is that's waiting outside.

Brian's awareness sharpens as a figure comes through the doorway and into the light. It's Vince. The sight of him is like ice water thrown over Brian. 

"You don't worry about him," Dom says. "Look at me. Look at me." Brian obeys. Dom nudges at his shoulder. "Lie back."

Brian really doesn't want to. But right now he can't find the will to resist Dom. He does as he's told, the couch cushions soft at his back. He lies there stiff with unease, looking pleadingly up at Dom.

"It'll be over real quick," Dom tells him softly, then he looks back towards Vince and Vince comes slowly forward, staring at Brian, his expression stiff, hostility visible in the dark gleam of his eyes, the unhappy set of his mouth, the clench of his fists at his sides.

Brian's wolf crouches, fur bristling, lips pulled back, a low snarl in his throat as the other man draws near. He looks helplessly to Dom. He hates being on his back like this. He hates feeling weak and drugged like this. He can't fight, he won't be able to protect himself.

"It's okay," Dom says. He moves to make room, crouching by the arm of the couch, keeping his hand on Brian's shoulder.

Vince looks at Dom for a moment, some silent communication going on, then he kneels where Dom had been and starts to lean over Brian, bracing his hand on the back of the couch. Brian can smell him, the alien stink of his skin, he can feel his wolf pressing close, can't see it yet—he starts to freak. He tries to sit up again, wants to at least be able to have some leverage and his arms to shield himself if Vince goes for him, he can't just lie there under him, he _won't_ –

Dom's hands are on his shoulder and chest, holding him firmly.

"Brian, you gotta relax for me, man," Dom says. "Ain't nobody gonna hurt you. Come on, you just look at me."

Brian's breathing shallow. His eyes dart from Vince's face to Dom's and back.

"Look at me," Dom says again. He moves his hand up Brian's chest, up his throat, and settles it there. It's like a shot of something, just his touch turns the tense set of Brian's muscles liquid. Just a touch and Brian puts himself entirely into Dom's hands. It should be terrifying. Somehow it just isn't.

"Yeah, that's it," Dom's voice rumbles low as he touches Brian's jaw, tilts his head. Brian blinks up at him sluggishly. "You're gonna give Vince your neck, okay, Brian?"

Brian feels a sharp stab of panic.

 _"Give him your neck,"_ Dom says again, a powerful undercurrent in his voice. It's a command. The force of it weaves through Brian's mind. He's bound to the order, disobedience is absolutely not an option.

He lies still, his eyes fixed desperately on Dom's face, silently pleading with him to take it back, knowing he's not going to.

Dom moves his hand away and Vince bends his head. The closeness is keenly uncomfortable, everything in Brian cringing away from it. The first brush of Vince's beard against his neck makes him jerk.

Vince's wolf emerges from the fog and stalks a wide arc, circling towards Brian, yellow eyes flashing. Brian's wolf backs up, his head low, a growl rattling from his throat, the noise quavering and ragged, a final attempt to warn the other wolf off.

"Easy," Dom says. His hand rests on Brian's jaw, just lightly, keeping the connection between them.

Vince's mouth moves over the mark Dom's made on Brian's neck, he presses his lips there, closed, almost like a kiss, but too hard, uncomfortable. His breathing is uneven, his body tense and coiled as he hunches over Brian, like he's gearing up to attack.

"Get on with it," Dom says sharply. 

Brian's been keeping his eyes on Dom, like he's been told to, but the moment Vince lunges for him, he squeezes his eyes shut.

The brown wolf collides with him with unnecessary force, jarring a yelp out of Brian. 

Brian clenches his jaw tight, his body jerking, trying to curl in on itself, for a second it's like Vince has just smacked a fist into his kidney.

He disengages from all instinct and his wolf drops, goes onto its back limp under Vince, and the big brown wolf gets its jaws around his neck, just rough enough to hurt without doing any damage.

Brian hears Dom saying something but there's noise like ocean waves churning in his ears and he can't make it out, he just knows that Dom sounds angry.

The brown wolf's jaws ease up a little, and soon after a strange stillness comes over Brian, like he's hit the eye of a tornado.

He can hear his wolf, like it's far away, not a part of him, whining soft and unhappy. 

"Just a little longer, Brian. You're doing good." The warm deep male voice penetrates the vacuum and Brian can feel a hand smoothing his hair back from his forehead, the touch calling him back to his human body.

Vince's head is still pushed into the crook of Brian's neck, his beard prickling Brian's skin. Vince breathes deep through his nose, slower now, and Brian finds himself inhaling in synch with him. Vince's human mouth is still pressed against the mark, his lips still pressed together, closed. Only Dom can open his mouth over Brian's mark.

"That's enough."

Vince seems not to hear the order at first, and Dom pushes at his shoulder and then Vince lifts his head, the couch cushion dipping next to Brian's arm as Vince gets leverage to push himself up.

"Mhn, yeah, okay," he grunts, his voice thick like he's just woken up.

Brian opens his eyes in time to see Vince get to his feet, and Vince looks down at him, something almost like confusion in his drowsy expression.

"Go on," Dom says. He moves around into Brian's eyeline so that Brian can't see as Vince leaves.

"You okay?" Dom's large hands carefully tilt Brian's head, tipping it how he wants it, before he bends to mouth at Brian's neck, moving his lips and then his tongue over the mark, slow and deliberate, swiping his tongue hot over the achingly tender bruise where Brian's pulse is throbbing, cleaning any trance of Vince's scent off him. The alpha crouches over Brian's wolf, giving the ruff of fur at his neck the same treatment, thorough, checking him for injury.

"Come on, let's get you inside," Dom says after a long, quiet stretch of minutes. He helps Brian to sit up. Brian doesn't want to do much else apart from sleep right now. His head feels a little clearer at least.

He's not thinking as he leans forward and brushes his nose under Dom's jaw, one side and then the other, the formal gesture for paying tribute, showing deference. When he draws back, Dom is considering him, his eyelids heavy, expression unreadable. Brian thinks for a moment he's done something wrong. It's possible Dom isn't the sort of alpha to demand that kind of formality, who in fact resents such displays. But Dom doesn't say anything.

He takes Brian outside, supporting him with his arm around Brian's waist, Brain's arm around his shoulder, because he's still unsteady on his feet.

The night air is warm on Brian's face, doing nothing to cool the flush in his cheeks.

They go around the back of the house to the kitchen door and the first thing Brian sees is Mia sat at the table. She stands up sharply as they come in, scraping her chair back.

She doesn't say anything and neither does Dom. He nudges Brian on towards the doorway, the living room, and Mia just stands silent, looking small and young in her long pajama t-shirt, her dark hair for once messy. Brian turns his head awkwardly trying to look back at her, a sick feeling of guilt twisting in his stomach as he catches the pinched look on her face.

Dom puts him down on the couch. It's larger and less lumpy than the one in the garage. Brian slumps onto his side and mashes his face into the cushion. He's asleep between one breath and the next.

~*~


	3. Chapter 3

Brian wakes with his arm curled around his head, breathing thickly into the crease of his elbow.

He senses somebody close and he twists, squinting against the clean, thin yellow morning light that fills the room.

Mia is putting a mug down on a coaster on the side table.

Brian sits up with a grunt, rubbing his face. He looks at his watch—it's early, not yet gone seven.

"Coffee," Mia says, backing up, folding her arms.

He picks up the mug, holds it by its hot rim. He says thank you and drinks. He watches her as she goes and ties back the curtains. There's quiet tinkling noise like bells drifting in from outside, wind chimes in some neighbor's garden.

Mia leaves the room, comes in again with a ring binder and puts it inside a book bag on the dinner table.

"I've got class later. If you want a shower you'd better have it now."

"I'll grab one at Harry's," Brian says.

Mia takes her bag through to the kitchen.

Brian hears her moving things around, the clink of plates and glasses. He gets up and goes to the bay windows, looking out at the front yard, the houses across the street. He presses his palm over the mark on his neck. 

"Dom already left," Mia says as he comes into the kitchen.

Brian looks at her but she won't look at him, she keeps her face turned away as she unpacks the dishwasher.

"Can I use the bathroom?" he says.

She nods.

~*~

The mark is purplish, right on his jugular. He turns his head, looking at it in the mirror, touching the skin hot under his fingers and then rubbing with the inside of his wrist and smelling his wrist. Dom's scent is still strong on him.

He moves away from the sink. He stands for a while with one hand braced against the cool bathroom tile, his other hand over his mouth.

~*~

Brian's got a cell phone stashed in the locker in the back room of Harry's. He needs to call Tanner.

"I'll get going."

Mia keeps her back to him as she sets a frying pan on the stove, opens the fridge and pulls out butter, a carton of eggs. She shakes her head as she unwraps the butter and gets a knife out the drawer.

"Will you have lunch with me?" Brian says.

She turns at last.

"Why did you do it?"

Brian leans against the counter, looks aside at where light shudders and flashes silver on the sink's draining board, sun through the leaves of the tomato plants standing in the yard.

"I didn't want you to do that for me," Mia says. "Tell me you didn't do it for me."

"That would be pretty intense." Brian rubs his neck. He catches himself at it and drops his hand again. 

"You don't know me. You don't know my family." Her mouth takes on a grimace, a hard sort of disbelieving smile. "Do you know what you're doing?"

Brian looks at her shoulder, the shape of the bone. He can't look her in the eye. 

The kitchen is quiet for a long beat, the sunlight sparking and rushing in a mute riot on the draining board, the wind chimes making a dull noise still somewhere outside.

"I'd better go," Brian says, clearing his throat, pushing away from the counter. Mia doesn't say anything to stop him leaving.

~*~

He drives to Silver Lake, parks up near the intersection and gets out, waits leaning on the wall of a concession stand, the front's shut up. There's construction going on across the road. Not a lot of people around.

He's waiting forty-five minutes and wishing he'd hung on at Harry's after making the call, showered. He's wishing he had.

He stays leaning unmoving against the wall as the unmarked brown Camry comes down the strip and pulls in and the two men get out.

Muse makes a slow circular motion with his finger for Brian to turn and Brian turns and braces his hands up on the wall and spreads his feet and Muse starts patting him down.

Tanner comes right up close to Brian's shoulder and Brian keeps his eyes ahead, staring at the brick.

"You gotta be kidding me," Tanner mutters. He's standing on Brian's left. Clear view of the purple-bruised mark on his neck. He turns away from Brian and Brian drops his head while Muse finishes up.

"Get in. Get in the car." Tanner opens the back door and Brian climbs in and across the seat and Tanner gets in after him, hauling the door closed roughly. The car dips as Muse gets in the driver seat and once his door shuts the noise off the street dims and it's still and quiet and uncomfortably hot inside the car. 

"Have you lost your mind?" Tanner says.

Brian pushes himself around to sit up straighter, trying to arrange his legs in the cramped foot well. He feels Tanner watching him and braces his arm up on the door, wipes the sweat off his lip. 

"You know this is the way it was going."

"This was not—" Tanner bites it off. He shakes his head and looks away like he's trying to stay calm.

"This was the only way we were gonna get close enough," Brian says.

"What did I say to you when we started this?"

"Bilkins was right, we don't have time—"

"What did I say to you? You were going to come to me, anything like this, you come to me first—"

"Yeah, well, you weren't there," Brian says. 

"Bilkins," Tanners murmurs. "Son of a bitch."

"I've got it under control. Dom knows who's jacking the trucks, he'll tell me. I'm above suspicion now."

Tanner's looking ahead at nothing. In profile his face looks older. The sky's vivid unreal blue through the car window and the wrinkles at the corner of his eye show deep. His hand rests in a tight fist on his knee.

"I can handle this," Brian says.

Tanner looks at him, pins him with a look, eyes narrowed behind his glasses.

Brian knows what he can smell, the car stinks with it.

"You're compromised," Tanner says.

Brian throws his arm wide, elbow smacking the back of the driver's seat. "I'm not the first Wolf who did this for the job. Dom was going to shut me out, I had to go to him."

"Of course you did." Tanner takes his glasses off. He rubs his eyes. "You've never been somebody's pack, Brian. You don't know what you've handed over."

"I didn't hand over my badge."

Brian says it hotly, he's been pushing away thoughts of last night since waking. The weak struggle he put up when Dom had him against the car, a hazy recollection of Dom's hand warm on his belly—

"I know what I'm doing." He looks away out the window and tries to shift his legs again in the cramped space. 

"You're a _pup_ ," Tanner says.

Brian goes still. He sits still with his head turned away, his jaw clenched tight.

"It's done now," Tanner says after a beat of quiet. 

The intersection stoplight blinks red and the road outside fills with cars slowing to a halt. The air wavers baking on the metal roofs.

"The decision's been taken to move on Johnny Tran."

That turns Brian around.

"We don't have enough yet." 

"The Bureau's impatient." Tanner smiles at him grimly. "You know that already."

"Give me until the end of the week. Hold them off until I have something real—"

Tanner's shaking his head before Brian's even getting started. "Unless you've got serious doubt, they're going ahead."

Tanner leans forward and pats the side of the driver's seat. "Let's get back," he says. 

Muse starts the car and Brian reaches for the door handle and gets stopped by Tanner's hand on his arm. 

"You're coming with." Tanner points ahead and Muse turns the wheel and waits to swing out as the stoplight changes.

"What for?" Brian says.

"I'm pulling you out. Two days."

"You kidding me?" Brian reaches for the door again. "I can't just disappear."

"Ideal time for it," Tanner says mildly, his gaze directed ahead.

"What are you talking about?" Brian looks at the back of Muse's head, looks back at Tanner in frustration. He gestures to his neck. "Look, you said it, it's done. This is an asset, we've got to use it."

"You need some distance. You're too close." Tanner turns his gaze to Brian and the look is steady, measuring. "If I let you do this, I need you focused."

Muse feeds into the renewed flow of traffic, his arm resting on the window frame as he drives. 

The breeze from the car's motion stirs warm across Brian's face, makes him feel the sweat on him. A strange nameless anxiety is coming up in him. They've left Harry's truck parked up by the concession stand. Brian twists to look out the back window, faces ahead again. The mark on his neck feels hot and like it's throbbing low with the beat of his blood.

"I showed up at his door last night," he mutters, his voice rough. "How's it going to look if I take off without telling anybody?"

"It'll look normal," Tanner says. "Young guy, first time starting in a pack." He nods his head. "Toretto knows the deal. Plenty of young men run the first time. Then they come back."

Brian squirms in his seat again, looks back again. "I can't leave."

"What's important right now is you build up a wall. You make it strong. Everything depends on you maintaining your distance now." 

Brian doesn't say anything.

"You gave him your neck," Tanner says in an undertone. "You can't pretend you're immune to the effects of that action—"

"I'm not," Brian says. He looks at the back of Muse's head, resents him hearing this, any of it.

Tanner sighs. "It had to be Toretto…" He rubs his forehead, quiet for several seconds. When he speaks again, it's all business. 

"You keep the wolf close, get your system cleared out. When you get back in, you keep apart as much as you can. Don't let yourself get familiar. Don't let Toretto in again if you can help it."

"What was the point of me doing this if I can't get close?"

Tanner looks over at him, the turn of his head sharp, surprised. "For Christ's sake, think about yourself. You get any deeper with this…"

~*~

_[Missing Scene: Brian spends two days with Tanner working at the operations base, he finds his sleep is broken and disrupted, he doesn't want to eat, he's constantly fighting the compulsion to return to Dom and the pack]_

~*~

"I could keep you out until the end of the week. What do you think?"

Tanner is a dark shape in the passenger seat bathed now and then in the arrhythmic pulses of streetlight slanting through the car.

Brian sits in the back, his arms tight folded across his chest.

"I think you look like crap, is what I think," Tanner says when Brian says nothing, "and a week or two weeks isn't going to make any difference, and what I should be doing is pulling you out right now." They pass another light and the glare catches on the lens of Tanner's glasses, his face lit and then dark again. "So tell me I'm wrong."

"I'm good," Brian says. The guy driving keeps looking back at him in the rearview.

"Reassuring," Tanner grunts.

"I'm set." Brian jogs his foot restlessly. "If it is the Trans I'm not even going to be in this for much longer."

"Do you think it's Johnny Tran?"

"Could be him."

Tanner grunts, sits stewing while the car winds on through the dark suburbs. 

"You're not working at Harry's anymore," he says absently.

"I figured."

"You'll be in close with Toretto now. It's not going to be as easy for you to check in. You keep the cell phone at Harry's, you wait on us to contact you unless there's something big. Yes?"

Brian catches the driver's eye in the mirror. The guy looks away.

"Yes, sir," Brian says.

They drop him a fifteen minute's walk from the house.

Tanner waves Brian to the window as he's getting out.

"Keep it close. You don't leave yourself open. Wolf stays by you, no direct contact, you just keep to that as much as you can."

"Yes, sir."

"Alright." Tanner closes and loosens his jaw like he's chewing something, then he shakes his head unhappily and looks up at Brian. "Go on then, you're standing there like that, going to make me change my mind."

Brian moves off down the dark sidewalk and the car passes him shortly after. He watches the red glow of the taillights until they're out of view and then he quickens his pace, jogs across the road and presses on towards the house, drawn along by a nagging ache in his belly, a two-day ache, drawn along like there's a line and the hook's in his innards.

He hears the music before he sees the house. He comes down the street and he can see the light spilling out the front windows onto the lawn and over the cars all parked up. There are people standing drinking out on the porch and Brian doesn't break stride as he heads up the path, breathing through his nose, smelling and trying to sort through as much as he can in these short moments. 

He's starting up the steps, his head down, when there's a shriek of laughter from above—a girl stumbling through the front door, and Vince with her, holding her from behind, his arms around her middle. Brian stops where he is as he's hit by the smell of him and Vince lifts his head suddenly, the smile dropping off his face.

"You. Where the fuck have you been?"

Brian backs up into the shrub on the side of the path as Vince launches himself down the steps, then Vince has him by the front of his shirt and he's hauling him sideways, shoving him in the chest. 

The five people standing with their beers under the porch gable have stopped their conversation, they stand watching and one of the girls says 'Oh my god', laughing, as Vince shoves Brian again.

"You try and bail after everything Dom's done for you, you piece of shit?"

Brian lets himself go back another step and drops his chin, looking down and off to the side, keeping his posture loose, doing nothing while Vince crowds him.

"You got something to say?" Vince's face is close enough that his nose brushes Brian's cheek. Brian stays silent. Vince is tense like he wants to hit him. He grabs Brian's shoulder instead and pushes him towards the steps. "Inside," he says. He pushes the party guests unceremoniously out the way, keeping his fingers fisted in the shoulder of Brian's tee-shirt and escorting him roughly along. He takes him through into the kitchen and there're more people stood drinking.

"Get out of here," Vince snarls, waving his arm. The kitchen empties out, people going out into the back yard throwing irritated looks back at them.

Vince kicks a chair out from the table and shoves Brian towards it.

"Sit."

Brian sits. He looks at Vince's scuffed boots.

"You gonna look me in the eye?" Vince says, leaning down, both hands braced on the table top, ducking his head and trying to goad Brian into it. "Yeah," he says, "I didn't think so." He pushes up straight, circles around Brian. "Run away like a little bitch… What you running from?"

Brian keeps his mouth shut and his head down.

"Dom's the best alpha you're ever gonna get. You think you're gonna find someone better?" Vince comes into his space, his hand on the back of Brian's chair. Brian doesn't move except to lean his head away slightly. Prior to the marking, he would have found Vince's clamoring nearness unbearable, and he never liked Vince's scent, not since the first time he smelled it. Not now though, none of it's an issue now.

He thinks about how he lay on his back on the couch out in the garage, how out of it he'd been. Vince's beard scratching at his neck. 

"Where you been, two goddamn days?" Vince says, breathing hot on Brian's cheek, beer on his breath. "Huh? You throw something like that back in Dom's face? After he's let you in? Is that what you do, you fucking pussy?"

Brian turns his head away some more, doing everything to put out non-confrontation. "Where is he?"

"I say you could talk, asshole?" Vince grabs the neck of Brian's shirt and yanks, puts his forehead against Brian's and Brian can hear his wolf growling noisily. It's all show. Brian doesn't know how he knows with such certainty, but he does. He keeps on sitting there. He doesn't tense, doesn't try and pry his tee-shirt out the grip of Vince's fist.

"I could run you off," Vince says, right by his ear. "Wouldn't take much, would it?" He twists Brian's collar tighter. "You stink. Where'd you go, huh?"

"Does Dom know he's back?" Leon's leaning in the doorway with a beer in his hand.

Vince doesn't answer. He grinds his forehead into the ridge bone of Brian's brow, then he puts his hand on Brian's jaw and shoves so Brian almost goes off the chair and onto the floor.

"Vince."

Vince straightens up slowly.

"Did you call Dom?" Leon goes and takes the phone down off the wall and starts dialing it. "You been up and told Mia?" He puts the phone to his ear. "Hey. You told Mia?"

Vince wipes his nose. "I ain't told Mia."

"So go tell her."

"I ain't telling her."

"Brian showed up," Leon says into the phone, his head going to one side. He turns to lean against the sink. "Yeah, just now."

Brian reaches up and pulls his collar straight and Vince puts his hand on the back of his neck, gripping hard.

"Alright, cool." Leon hangs the phone back on the wall mount. "They're headin back from Letty's." He looks over at Vince and Brian. "You want to ease up, bro?"

Vince pulls his hand away and goes to the door. "Somebody turn that goddamn music off! 'Bout time you assholes cleared out of here."

Leon looks Brian over. He tips back his beer and drinks deeply. He grimaces lowering the bottle, sighs.

"You hungry?"

"He ain't eating." Vince comes back in and jerks the backdoor shut and locks it. 

"We should tell Mia," Leon says.

Vince paces around the table with his hands on his hips.

Jesse's head appears around the doorway.

"Man," he says vaguely as he picks at the paint on the doorframe, his eyes darting between Leon and Vince standing before the table and Brian still sitting in his chair that's an uncomfortable distance from the table, too far to look like he's sitting there casually.

"Man," Jesse says again. "It's like some—" he gestures with his hand "Mexican standoff shit in here or something, man." 

"Go tell Mia he's back," Leon says.

"You stay where you are." Vince points at Jesse without looking at him.

"Go tell her."

"Tension, man," Jesse mutters, smiling tightly and then frowning. "This much tension, you know…it's not healthy, man." He ducks back out of sight. Vince growls.

"Let him go," Leon says. He goes and opens the fridge and crouches looking into it. Vince stands and looks at Brian.

"He ain't eating."

"You miserable son of bitch." Leon moves stuff around in the fridge.

"We wait on Dom. How it's supposed to be." Vince raises his voice, speaking at Brian, "Not that this gives a shit about how things supposed to be done. Go turning tail after you get claimed. What kind of ignorant bullshit is that, you want to tell me?"

"Lay off him."

"Sittin there…" Vince says, glowering at Brian "like butter wouldn't melt."

Brian shifts in his chair, rolling his shoulder slightly. He looks at the floor.

He feels Mia coming before he hears her footsteps on the stairs coming down and Jesse's right behind her.

Vince hisses air through his teeth and shakes his head and then Mia comes into the kitchen.

"Brian?"

She comes and stands in front of him. Brian clasps his hands between his knees. She crouches and puts her hands over his and they look at each other.

"Does Dom know?" she says as her eyes move over Brian's face.

"He's on his way," Leon says.

She pushes her hand through her hair, resting her elbow on Brian's knee, the tension collapsing out of the set of her shoulders. She closes her eyes for a moment.

"I, ah, I don't" Jesse is standing with Leon and Vince. He's picked up a bowl of nuts and he searches through it with his face downturned. "I mean, is he, like, in big trouble?"

"I'm sorry," Brian says quietly, to Mia.

"We didn't know what had happened to you," she says.

"Dom could have tracked him if he'd wanted to," Vince mutters.

Mia turns her head and stares at the three men. Jesse is clumsily tipping a handful of nuts into his mouth.

"Can you all go somewhere else?" she says.

"Dom's coming back," Vince says.

"So go somewhere else until he's back."

Vince juts his chin at Brian. "You gonna ask him where he's been at?"

Leon takes his arm and pushes him towards the door.

"Ask him," Vince says. He lets Leon push him and they go out. Jesse gets a soda out of the fridge.

"Jesse."

"I'm goin, I'm goin." He holds up his hands as he backs out, bumping his shoulder into the doorframe.

Mia gets up. She has her hands around Brian's wrists and she tugs and he gets to his feet, the kitchen chair creaking. He goes to touch her, put his hands on her hips, and then thinks better of it. Mia watches him quietly.

"He said you'd be back."

"Dom?"

She nods. "I didn't mean those things I said. It was just—a lot to handle."

"I know. I'm sorry."

"Is that why you left?"

Brian doesn't like the conversation.

"I did it wrong," he says. He shocks himself saying it, he hadn't planned on saying it.

"Did what wrong?"

He feels sick for a moment. There's no judgment in her dark eyes looking up at him.

"The way I joined the pack." He clears his throat. "I should have thought about you."

Mia smiles wryly. "Yeah, well. I guess I should be used to it by now. This is Dom's pack. It's always been about him."

~*~

They've all been waiting for what feels like an uncomfortably long time in the front room when finally light from the car's headlamps flashes across the glass and sweeps the wall.

They listen as the engine cuts. The sound of the car doors banging.

Letty comes in through the front door first, pulling off her jacket, Dom following after her. 

Letty stops in the doorway and looks in at them. She's got a stick from a lollipop between her teeth. She takes it out of her mouth. "What a picture."

Dom comes up beside her and puts his hand on the back of her head and then down her neck and she moves back a step and lets him in the doorway.

Dom's eyes are on Brian.

"Okay," Dom says. He looks the rest of them over briefly and then crosses the room and goes into the kitchen.

Brian hesitates for maybe five seconds with the others all staring at him, then he follows after Dom.

Dom points at the fridge. "Beer?"

Brian looks at the fridge and then looks at Dom's boots.

"Water?" Dom says.

Brian nods.

"Sit there."

Brian moves the chair nearer the table and sits. Dom gets a glass down out the cupboard and fills it from the tap and puts it in front of him. Brian puts his hand around it.

"Go ahead."

Brian swallows half the water and lowers the glass, then lifts it again and downs the remainder. He sets the glass on the table and Dom wordlessly takes it, fills it again, puts it in front of him.

Brian goes slower drinking it. Dom steps out of the kitchen and says something quietly in the other room. He comes back in and takes his phone and his wallet out of his pockets, lays them on the table.

"You look hungry."

Brian sits hunched forward leaning over his glass, tipping the last bit of water from side to side. "I’m fine."

"Sure about that?" Dom opens the fridge and taps his fingers on the side of the door. He pulls out a big serving dish of chicken and a bowl of pasta salad and another bowl of roasted vegetables.

"Left overs." Dom puts the stuff on the table along with two plates and some cutlery out the drawer.

"Really—I, uh—" Brian moves back as Dom puts a plate in front of him.

"Don’t tell me. You already ate." Dom drops into the seat opposite Brian and starts taking the film off the food. 

"Yeah," Brian says.

Dom nods, spooning some pasta onto his plate. He digs the spoon back in with the handle towards Brian and nudges the bowl closer to him.

"Have some."

"I’m – really not hungry."

"That’s what you keep saying."

"I’m not," Brian says sharply. It comes out more forcefully than he means it to, and he darts a look up at Dom. Dom’s just watching him calmly. Brian drops his eyes again, stares at the empty plate in front of him.

"I'm going to ask you something," Dom says. "You don't want to answer it, then don’t."

Brian nods once.

"You had an alpha before?"

Brian doesn't say anything for a while. He thinks about the lie he should tell.

"Nah," he says finally. “I mean…my Dad was—for our family. But I don’t remember much about that. He left when I was still pretty young.” 

“Nobody after that?” 

Brian shakes his head.

“This the first time you been marked?” Dom says.

The kitchen and the rest of the house seem oppressively silent suddenly. Brian scratches at the side of his neck. He nods. 

“Alright,” Dom says mildly. “Question round's over.” He picks something from his plate and eats it. "I'll tell you how it is. You can go around where you like, you tell me about it ahead of time. You come and talk to me. That's how it's going to be. You got problems, they're my problems. You got shit in your past, it ain't yours like before. You don't do it alone anymore. Brian."

The sound of his name makes him tense.

"Look at me."

Brian does it. He feels something give inside him as he does it.

"Clear?" Dom says.

"Yeah."

"Okay." Dom nods to indicate the spread between them. "I don't like eating by myself. You gonna help me out here?"

Brian rubs at his neck. "You put it like that…"

"Get some food on your plate."

They don't talk while they eat. Brian can feel Dom's gaze on him now and then. The flavor of the food is vivid in his mouth and his mouth is wet with saliva between bites, he chews and swallows as quickly as he can without being impolite and doesn't slow when Dom gets up from the table to fill his glass again at the tap. He sets his fork down and drinks the warmish water then returns to eating, not thinking beyond the good sensations, taste, filling his stomach, Dom's presence in the room and their bodies in relation to one another. It's good to be in his home, near him. Brian eats and doesn't let himself think.

Dom's long since finished by the time Brian wipes his mouth and sits back in his chair. Dom's got a beer in his hand. Brian doesn't remember him getting it out the fridge.

Dom puts the food that remains back in the fridge and Brian automatically rises and puts the plates and knives and forks together and carries them over to the sink.

"Leave that," Dom says. He leans on the sideboard, holding his beer loosely against his chest, and Brian takes the counter opposite. They don't speak for a while. Brian breathes slowly, pulling on the smell coming off him. The anxious knot that's been in his chest since leaving has gone.

Tanner's tense face peering up at him from the car comes into his mind. He blinks himself back to alertness—realises his wolf has been sitting upright for some time at the boundary of his control, sits pointed at Dom, ears forward, its whole posture like an arrow pointing.

He clears his throat and pulls it back, forces it scrambling reluctantly back, and draws his defenses closer about himself.

Dom sets the beer on the counter.

"Don't worry about it." He looks off past Brian's shoulder, out the dark kitchen window. "It gets easier."

He pushes away from the counter and goes to the door, tries the handle. He twists the key and opens the door onto the warm night. He leans in the doorway, looking out towards the garage, his face in shadow.

"You can stay in Jesse's room tonight," Dom says. "I'm gonna work on the car for a bit."

"You want help?"

"Get some sleep."

Dom looks like he's about to step out into the yard, so Brian goes quickly towards him, the doorway, aware there's usually some procedure with all this. 

Dom watches, inscrutable, while Brian tries to find the momentum to carry him into the alpha's space.

"I, uh. So I'll..." Brian rounds his shoulders and almost sways a little where he stands, one hand behind him holding the corner of the countertop. He gets a flash of the other night, holding onto the workbench trying to delay the inevitable.

"You don't have to do that," Dom murmurs, but then Brian comes forward and rubs the side of his face and his nose under Dom's jaw. Dom stands very still and straight, lifts his chin very slightly so Brian can breathe the other side of his neck as well. The gesture complete, Brian backs up quickly, avoiding Dom's eye.

It's the only formal acknowledgement he's been taught, and this way is almost correct, the proper way for lower pack to greet the alpha—almost correct, but not entirely. He should be baring his wolf to Dom's scrutiny, dropping his defenses.

Dom nods once, a small tilt of his head.

Brian thinks he's going to call him out now. All he needs to do is call. Brian knows with sudden certainty he won't stay back if Dom calls him now.

But he just holds Brian's eye for a moment longer and then steps out the back door, down the steps. He nudges the door shut after him.

Brian looks around the empty kitchen.

~*~


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I've always wanted to keep writing this fic and finish it, but I'm afraid it might be some time before I can come back to it. Thank you so much for all the supportive comments, I stopped replying because I feel bad abandoning fic and letting people down, but I still want to try and come back to this in the future if I can.

Brian is in the small spare room with Jesse, there's a fold-out bed for him, Jesse sleeps on a mattress on the floor. 

"It's all good," Jesse says, sprawled on his back on the narrow space of floor between the mattress and the bed, supping fastidiously at a joint. "I mean, you smell good to me, so, ah. Mi casa es…etcetera."

Brian lies with his arms folded across his chest. He listens to the sounds through the house, shuts his eyes. He tenses as he realises he's pulling slow breaths in, sorting through the different odors without meaning to, picking Dom's body out above the others in the house. He feels drawn like the tide's going out around him, dragging at his limbs.

~*~

Leon drives him to Harry's the next day, so he can pick up his stuff. Really so that he can phone Tanner.

He shuts himself in the bathroom in the back. Tanner launches in without a hello.

"It's not looking good. The vehicles in the garage weren't black Civics. The VCRs were legally purchased. The gang members we picked up O.R.'d on bail an hour ago, Johnny and Lance were among them."

"But the serial numbers I pulled—"

"Weren't a match with the manifest."

Brian puts his arm up against the wall, his hand to his head. "Fuck."

"That's about the size of it." Tanner sighs. "Bilkins is in the shit with the federal DA."

Brian rubs his eyes.

"Tell me you've got something from Toretto."

"It doesn't add up," Brian mutters. "It's Johnny, it has to be—"

"Is that what you really believe?"

"It's the only thing that makes sense." Brian goes to the door, opens it, looks out, shuts it again. "I've got to go."

"Hey. Are you keeping apart?"

"Yeah. Yeah, it's fine."

"Has Toretto called you to him?"

"No, not yet."

"Not yet."

"He's waiting me out."

Tanner's quiet for a stretch. 

"Be careful."

"Yeah. I'll check in when I can." Brian cuts the call. He looks down at the phone in his hand, then over at his double in the mirror.

He stashes the cell back in the locker outside, grabs his duffle bag and heads out with it over his shoulder. Leon's waiting for him out front, leaning against his car smoking.

"That it?"

"Yup."

"All settled up?"

Brian tosses his bag in the back. "Yup."

~*~

He's crouched cleaning the shoe on the Supra's brake drum.

Jesse's in the back, holed up in his cubby hammering at the computer keys in a kind of trance state with Metallica roaring in his headphones.

Vince is sitting behind the front desk, his feet up, crossed at the ankle on the counter. He's got a parts magazine open in his hands but he hasn't turned a page in a while.

Brian tears off a clean piece of emery cloth and scrubs methodically at the brake shoe. He senses movement from the front of the shop. He feels Vince coming over.

"What is it with you?"

"What do you mean?" Brian keeps scrubbing.

"You move in. You've got one bag? You tryin to make me believe you're some kind of bum or something? Who only has one bag of shit?" Vince is pacing around behind him. "And how come you never call nobody? You got nobody? Not a single goddamn friend on the earth? You don't got family somewhere?" Vince's boots scuff the floor. "Nah. You might have fooled the others, but you aint fooled me."  
Brian throws a glance over his shoulder. "Are you saying I fooled Dom?"

Vince pulls up short. "What? I never said that, you fuckin snake."

Brian shakes his head slightly. His hands are brown with grime off the brake shoes. He gestures to the rag on top of the tool chest.

"Can you pass me that?"

"Get it your own damn self." Vince comes and leans his hand against the car. "Who you think you are, trying to give orders?"

"I wasn't."

"You disagreeing with me? Huh?" Vince shoves his shoulder, Brian's squatting on his heels so it takes nothing to push him sideways onto his ass. He doesn't try to pull himself up. He props his elbows on his knees, resigned.

"Or am I right?" Vince says.

"You're right."

"Yeah I'm right. I'm always right. Because in case you hadn't noticed, asswipe, you're bottom of the food chain around here. Aint nobody lower than you."

Brian regards Vince patiently.

"You think you're tough shit?" Vince says.

"I think I need to have these clean before Dom gets back."

"Yeah, that's another thing, don't think I hadn't noticed." Vince leans in towards him, eyes narrowed. "You don't show him no respect. I seen what you do."

"What's that?"

"You keep back. You don't go to him. I seen you." Vince nods, gratified, when Brian doesn't answer. "What is it, you think you're above it all?" He leans closer still, his voice low. "You think your prissy little snow white self's too good to show respect to the alpha?"

Brian looks at the brake drum.

"Is that how it is, snowflake?"

Brian can't wholly disguise his reaction to the name.

"What, don't like that?" Vince laughs, pleased.

"What do you want, man?"

"I want to see you" Vince points a finger in his face "show some respect."

"I thought I already did that for you." Brian meets his gaze. "You want my neck again?"

It gets the response he wanted. Vince rears back, huffing and sputtering.

"No! What—what the fuck? I didn't—That's not what I—I never said—" He puts himself a good five feet away from Brian. "The fuck is wrong with you?" His face gets a pinched look. "You say that again I'll knock your fuckin teeth out."

Brian picks up the emery cloth and starts back up on the drum.

Vince keeps standing there like he's immobilized with outrage. Finally he goes back to the front desk and sits and angrily opens up his magazine.

~*~

"It's none of my business or anything…" Jesse says one night, speaking into the dark.

Brian looks up at the bar of light that splits the ceiling diagonal from the door to the far wall.

"Absolutely…none of my business," Jesse says into his pillow. 

"What is it, man?" Brian murmurs, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

"Ah." Jesse rustles around. "Nah, forget it. Dom's better at this type of stuff."

"What type of stuff?"

"Pack stuff," Jesse sighs, his voice getting thick with wanting to sleep. "He always knows what to do."

~*~

They put the new windows in the Supra. They mask it up with paper and tape, ready for painting. The shocks and struts have been installed, the hood's bolted on. It's getting close to finished.

Brian keeps his distance from Dom while they're working. He avoids him as best he can in the house. Dom just keeps giving him space. He waits like there's all the time in the world.

~*~

Brian wakes three days straight with his briefs clinging to him, sticky with semen. He hasn't had a wet dream since he was a teenager.

~*~

_[Missing Scene: Dom begins to suspect from Brian's behaviour that he's hiding something, he thinks there's something different lately about Brian's scent]_

~*~

Letty goes and picks up her jacket and keys from the counter.

"Who's riding with me?" She steps out the back door.

"Right here." Jesse jolts the table with his knee as he stands up.

"How about you, puppy?" Letty calls from the yard.

Brian straightens up involuntarily and Vince starts laughing.

"You gonna let her call you that?" he says. 

"Go on, move it." Dom jerks his newspaper at the door. "Not you," he adds as Brian starts to rise out his seat.

Vince looks between them in confusion. 

"Go on," Dom says.

Vince shakes his head and leaves.

Brian hears Letty's car start up out the front and Vince's soon after.

Dom finishes his coffee. Brian pushes his plate away from him with his thumb and rests his elbows up on the table.

"I'm coming Bakersfield with you?" he hazards.

"No." Dom folds his arms and looks out the door at the bright morning sky. "We gotta talk."

"Yeah?" Brian looks ahead at Vince's empty seat. The table, the kitchen, feels conspicuously empty now with just the two of them sat there with the remains of breakfast between them.

"Yeah," Dom says, no intonation in his voice. "Are you omega?"

Brian's got his hands in front of his mouth. He doesn't move for several seconds. He lowers his hands slowly and looks over at Dom. 

"What?"

"Are you omega?"

An incredulous smile tugs at Brian's lips. "Alright, Dom, man, come on—"

"Answer me."

"You're seriously asking me?" he says. "No. I'm not."

"You never had a heat?"

"Jesus." Brian can feel his face getting hot. "No. Where's this coming from?"

"I'm going to get you a test," Dom says.

"What? Why?"

Dom keeps on looking at him.

"Why do you think I'm an omega all of a sudden? Can you—Do I smell or something?"

"No." Dom's stony façade eases for a second. "I don't know. Could be it's just you being new. Your scent…"

"What about it?"

"I don't know," Dom says again.

"I'm not—in heat, okay. I'd know."

"Maybe. Maybe not."

"What would you know about it?" Brian says, his voice coming sharper than he means it to.

"I'm alpha. It's my job to know." 

"Well if you can't smell anything—"

"I don't know what I can smell." Dom stands abruptly, goes to the back door, braces his hands either side of the doorframe. "I never had an omega in my pack before."

Brian surges to his feet. "You don't have one now."

Dom turns around to face him. "Cool it."

"There's never been a guy in my family had it. Not my dad, nobody. There's no way."

"Isn't just biology. Sometimes…some guys…" Dom's face tenses, he looks squinting at the yard. "It's circumstances."

Brian wipes his nose with his thumb, turning his head away. "Yeah? That's bullshit right there."

Dom comes slowly out the doorway, comes towards him. "I said cool it."

"Did you make the other guys take tests?"

"I'm not arguing with you about this," Dom murmurs. His total composure tips something over the edge in Brian.

"How the hell would you feel?" He backs up and knocks into a chair. He shoves it away. "I'm not taking the test."

"Yeah you are."

"No way."

"You'll do what I say."

"Forget it." Brian starts for the door.

"Sit down," Dom says. The command in the words is like a gunshot, does something strange to the silence before and after it.

Brian tries to fight it. He stands at the threshold of the house. He fights it for as long as it takes to pull a breath in, his ribcage feels like it's constricted, like there's something wrapped around him keeping him from fully drawing breath, and simultaneously that tug at his navel, shocking in a fundamental, physical way.

He's not aware of crossing the kitchen, but then he's sitting back at the table, breathing a little unevenly. He rakes his hand through his hair.

Dom stands at his side.

"You answer me. You tell me the truth." 

It's a command.

"Don't," Brian says, his anger collapsing into real panic. "Okay. You don't have to—" He's helpless like this, disarmed, if he can't lie to Dom he could be a second away from blowing his cover. 

"Have you ever come into heat?"

"I don't know. When I was—" Brian squeezes his eyes shut, clamps his jaws together, trying to stop, but there's no stopping it "When I was fifteen. I don't know if it was—I don't remember. They said I was sick."

"Who?"

"My mom. The—I saw a doctor." Sweat has started in his armpits, up his back, prickling, clammy. He lifts his eyes desperately. "I'm not omega. I swear to god, I'm not lying." 

All Dom has to do is ask him if he's a cop.

"I'll take the test. Whatever you want. You just tell me, I'll do whatever you say." Brian's voice is forcibly calm, talking like he's a cop, like he's been trained to, like this is somebody he needs to keep calm, somebody pointing a loaded gun at him.

Dom sits down heavily. He grunts and scrubs his hand over his head.

"I wasn't gonna do it like this," he says. "You don't have to keep sitting there."

It's a release from the command, a release from telling the truth. 

The strangling compulsion to obey relaxes. The tension drains from Brian's body, he wilts, shakily lets out the breath in his lungs.

"If this is happening, I need to know," Dom says, sounding about as frustrated as Brian's ever heard him. "I'm trying to look out for you."

"Yeah," Brian says, "I know." He breathes carefully, he looks at the kitchen floor, his scuffed-up Vans, a little numbed from the narrowness of his escape. He can't afford to be in that situation again. He can't give Dom reason to wield that kind of power again.

_You've never been somebody's pack. You don't know what you've handed over._

Tanner had warned him.

Brian clears his throat.

"Sorry. I freaked."

He leans across the space between them, reaching for the arm of Dom's chair to brace himself. He brushes his cheek against Dom's jaw, a show of humility, and he keeps his eyes down as he settles back into his seat.

There's quiet, then Dom says, "You afraid of me?"

"Alpha's supposed to be kind of scary, right?" Brian smiles thinly. He tugs at a loose thread on the inseam of his jeans.

~*~

“Ah shit," Vince mutters after they've got their order and they're crossing the lot. "Letty's chili fries."

"I'll get it," Brian says.

"I'll get it." Vince pushes the brown paper bag into Brian's chest. "Letty don't want you paying for her food. Didn't they teach you anything in Arizona?"

"Yo, can I get a re-fill? 7 Up?" Jesse rattles the ice in his soda cup. "I'm dehydrating over here, man."

"It's like freakin daycare with you two. What do I look like?" Vince stalks back towards the concession stand.

Brian and Jesse trade grins.

They're almost at the car when they hear it. The rumble of motorcycle engines.

"Could be anybody," Jesse says easily, glancing at Brian over the roof of Vince's Maxima. They're parked right out front in the lot, there's no way to miss the car from the road.

Five motorcycles roar past. Brian and Jesse stand staring after them. 

The noise of the engines fade. 

"Didn't look like the Trans," Jesse says, but neither he nor Brian move. They watch the road.

The drone of the engines picks up again, climbing in volume once more. The bikes have circled around.

"Shit," Brian breathes. He dumps the bag of food on the car roof and turns. "Vince!"

Vince comes out from under the shadow of the stand awning. He's heard the bikes. He walks quick across the lot.

"Jesus H." He gets to them just as the Suzuki bikes rumble one after the other into the lot, filing in with sinister precision. "Just what we fuckin need."

"We can still get out of here," Brian says, foreboding settling over him. "Vince, come on."

Vince grabs him by the front of his t-shirt. "Just shut the fuck up and don't do anything stupid."

"Ohh man," Jesse murmurs, his attention fixed on the bikes.

The engines cut out. The riders dismount.

Johnny Tran starts towards them even as he's still taking his helmet off.

"What's happening, Johnny," Vince calls, lifting his chin.

Johnny passes his helmet between his hands, his movements sharp. He's still coming towards them. He's making no effort to conceal his wolf, Brian sees it as clearly as if he's seeing a double-exposure, man and beast, stalking forward, the wolf big and dark, its posture radiating menace and authority.

His four guys follow slower behind him. Brian recognizes Lance among them.

Johnny stops in front of Vince. He spits on the ground. 

"Where's your piece of shit alpha?"

Vince takes a slow step back, his shoulder bumping into Brian's. He puts his arm out and makes Brian back up as well.

"Dom aint here." Vince licks his lips. "We don't want no trouble with you, Johnny. This is neutral territory."

"Is it." Johnny's lips form a smile. There's nothing nice about it. 

Brian can feel the situation about to go bad. There's a code of behaviour for interaction between packs—Johnny shouldn't try anything without Dom here, but the aggression's coming off him in waves.

Brian turns his head slightly to Vince, dropping his gaze.

"Vince, come on, we should go," he says under his breath.

"I remember you." 

Brian glances up, it's reflexive to acknowledge an alpha's direct address. 

Johnny taps his own neck with two fingers. "I don't remember that."

"It's new," Lance says from behind.

Johnny tilts his shoulders, turning at the waist to address his cousin. "Is that right."

Lance is staring at Brian intently, unblinkingly.

"Lance can smell everything," Johnny says. He walks around Brian and Vince, holding a distance of about four feet. He looks carelessly across the lot. His men stand silent, expressionless, but with an attitude of leaning readiness, waiting on whatever order their alpha should give.

"So." Johnny laughs quietly. He puts a finger to his mouth, mock-contemplative. "A new addition to Toretto's pack of mongrels." His gaze shifts to Brian. "He must like you. He certainly seems to like marking you." He looks at Brian's neck, and his eyes on the mark feel like the shadow of a touch, a weightless, lingering look that nonetheless makes Brian's skin crawl. 

"They say it's like a tattoo, right? No getting rid of it. It might fade from the skin, but it never fades from here." Johnny points to his temple and then lets his hand drop to his side. "I gotta tell you. You picked a shitty tattoo. Your alpha's a fucking narc."

Brian feels Vince tense up beside him. 

"Or one of your new packmates. Either way, you're in bad company." Johnny takes a step towards Brian. "You can tell Toretto from me. What we got between us now—bad blood. No more fucking around. He sets LAPD on me? He wants to fuck with my family? Okay. Let's play."

"We don't know nothing about LAPD, man," Vince says. Brian can smell the sweat on his skin.

"You know what I'd do if I found out one of mine was a narc?" Johnny says softly. "I'd make him roll over for me. Then I'd rip his neck out." He makes a slicing motion with his thumb from his abdomen to his chin. "Maybe I'd open up his belly first."

Brian hears a shaky whimper from behind him and knows it's Jesse, unable to stifle himself any longer.

"Alright," Vince mutters, "we're out of here."

"You run back to your alpha," Johnny says. "You tell him what I said."

Vince fumbles for the driver door and Brian hears Jesse scramble to get in on the other side of the car.

Brian looks away from Johnny and his eyes land immediately on Lance and he can't help but pause, finding himself still the focus of such an intense regard.

"Lance," Johnny barks. The other man shifts slightly where he stands, but he doesn't break his gaze away.

"White wolf," he murmurs.

Johnny turns towards his cousin. "What?"

"I want to fight that one," Lance says.

"Spilner, get in," Vince says, half in the car and half out, holding onto the doorframe. "We aint doin brawls, man, no way."

Johnny steps slowly into Lance's eyeline. "Leave it alone."

Brian can hear from the tone of Johnny's voice that it's not a command. The alpha is too assured of his authority to bother.

Brian's reaching for the car door handle. His back is turned and he's unprepared for it when a wiry grey wolf suddenly lunges snarling at him from out of nowhere.

The wolf crashes into Brian's, it throws itself half onto his back and the scrambling weight of its body is grotesque. Brian knows he's moving, his body staggering, and there are maybe arms around him trying to pull him away or drag him to the ground—he is aware of it but strangely removed, as though seeing from outside, the slow ungainly tussle of human limbs, his body only abstractly familiar to him. His mind is locked in the wolf.

He's thrown the grey wolf off and it's coming at him again, they clash going up onto their hind legs, both of them snarling, snapping their jaws close, they drop and the grey wolf lunges without pause. Brian fails to anticipate it and in an instant Lance has a hold of the loose flesh and dense fur at Brian's shoulder, clamps his teeth around it fiercely and holds on as Brian thrashes. 

Lance releases him abruptly and falls away crouching. A second later he's on the ground, pinned under a black wolf—Johnny.

Brian has time to register the pain in his shoulder before he's thrown upwards, a lurching sensation in his gut as he returns to human consciousness. 

He's fallen back against the side of the car. It can only have been seconds he's been away, but in that short time chaos has erupted.

Vince is trying to haul him upright by the arm, yelling in his face, and past him Brian can see Johnny has Lance on the ground, face-down, he's got Lance's arm pinned up behind his back and his free hand fisted in Lance's hair. Lance isn't struggling, he lies still under the alpha, panting. Even at the awkward angle, with his cheek crushed against the tarmac, Lance's eye is still fixed on Brian.

"What the fuck's wrong with you?" Johnny yanks at Lance's hair roughly. "You lost your mind?"

"He's a bitch," Lance pants. "He's—"

"Get up, man, get up—" Jesse is helping Vince pull Brian to his feet. They open the back door of the car and Vince shoves Brian in and Jesse climbs in after, over him in a tangle, shoving at his legs. Vince lands in the driver's seat, slams his door, starts the engine, and Jesse reaches over and yanks the back door shut as they roar out of the lot.

"What in the name of fuck," Vince says, flexing his hands on the steering wheel.

"That was insane. That was— You hurt, Brian? You okay, man?" Jesse pats ineffectually at Brian's face and Brian pushes his hand away and pushes his narrow chest to get space enough to sit up.

"I'm fine."

"That was like—like—I can't believe that just happened." Jesse's staring at Brian goggle-eyed. "Did that just happen?"

"He get you?" Vince says.

"I'm okay." Brian puts his hand over his arm where the skin is hot and stinging, there's a patch scraped raw, he doesn't remember falling down.

Vince pushes out his breath, blowing out his cheeks.

"Vince, man, you gotta drop me at Harry's," Brian says.

Vince sits back sharply so he can squint at him in the rearview.

"What are you talking about, Harry's?"

"Just drop me at Harry's. I really—I need to go to Harry's." 

Vince looks at the road, looks up at the mirror, looks at the road. Brian sits stiffly leaning against the car door.

"What the fuck for?"

"Drop me there or pull over and I'll walk."

"He hit his head. Gotta be," Jesse mutters. 

"You don't work there no more, genius, remember? We're goin back to the shop, we're callin Dom."

"You can call him," Brian says, his voice cracking. "Just—drop me off first."

"You think Harry gives a shit?"

"Just do it."

"Do it, man," Jesse says. "It's what he wants."

"Yeah, and if he runs off like last time?" Vince shakes his head. "The Trans just went nuts and basically declared war. I'm not dropping him anywhere. What if they come after him again? He gets the shit kicked out of him, whose fault's it gonna be?"

"I'll open the door right now, I swear to god," Brian says, smacking at the handle with the back of his hand.

Vince drops him at Harry's.

He's still got the key for the back. He locks the door after him and then shuts himself in the store's cramped employee bathroom. He throws on the hot tap and tears off his t-shirt and starts slapping water over his face, his neck, down his chest. He starts rubbing himself with soap and then stops and fills his cupped hands with water in the too-small basin and rubs it through his hair. He's shaking. A reaction to the fight.

He pours more water over his head, it dribbles down his mouth and chin onto his jeans and the floor. He soaps his neck and grabs some paper towels and scrubs at the mark, then all over his neck, behind his ears, the back of his neck. The green paper towels are shredding up pulpy in his hands.

He shuts the tap off, the sink and the floor's a mess, he's a mess. He pulls his shirt back on and then bangs into the stall and takes a piss while he tries to calm his breathing.

He goes into the back room and one of Harry's employees is sat working at Harry's computer. He's just a kid. Human. Brian relaxes his rigid grip on the door handle.

"Go tell Harry to come back here," Brian says.

The kid stares at him and then scrambles up and goes.

Brian gets the cell phone out the locker. The battery's dead. He plugs it in at the wall and waits impatiently for the screen to light up before hitting Tanner's number. He stays crouched on the floor, his head bent, the phone crushed to his ear as it rings.

He gets Tanner's voicemail. Harry comes in as he's leaving his message.

"It's me. We gotta meet up, it has to be now. I'll wait on your call." 

He snaps the phone shut and leaves it charging on the floor. He holds onto the wall to push himself up. He's feeling light-headed, his vision speckling with grey. He feels like he might vomit.

Harry keeps back, hovering by door. "What, what is it, what's going on."

"Close the store. Go home."

"Close the—what are you talking about?"

Brian crosses the room unsteadily and sits down on the army cot that's against the back wall.

"I need this place empty. Now."

"Right." Harry blinks at him, starts to put his hand in his pocket and then doesn't. "Okay. I'll—" He hurries from the room.

Brian lies down on the cot, his back to the wall, he watches the doorway through half-closed eyes.

He allows himself to sink a little, feel for the wolf. It's curled in tight ball, wants to sleep. His shoulder aches where Lance got a hold of him.

Brian blinks against his eyes falling closed, but it's hard to fight the instinct to sleep, let the wolf heal. He thinks about getting up and checking the phone. It'll ring when Tanner calls, he'll hear it. He doesn't need to check it. He should check it. He shuts his eyes.

~*~

_[Missing: Brian's dreams are chaotic, half-delirious, he's starting to get a fever]_

~*~

There's banging—someone banging violently on a door.

Brian rolls to his feet, stumbles and catches himself with one hand on the wall.

"Brian! Brian, open up!" 

The banging's coming from the door that leads to the alley. Brian goes through the storeroom into the back. The door is shuddering in its frame with how hard it's being hit. Brian knows it's Dom. He's left the key in the door and he reaches to unlock it and then stops. He starts backing up, slowly, his dazed mind catching up with him—

"Open it," Dom's voice barks from the other side of the door.

Brian's hands fumble with the key. He feels the click of the bolt sliding back and then the handle is wrenched out of his hand.

The door swings open hard, bangs off the wall outside as Dom comes in. He grabs Brian by the front of his t-shirt, knuckles shoving hard at Brian's collarbone, he shoves and walks Brian back, the momentum and power of him make him like a wave exploding through the doorway.

Brian's back hits the wall.

"Dom—"

"He touch you?"

Dom grips Brian's chin roughly and pushes his head back, his skull thumps against the brick, he crowds in close and rubs his mouth into Brian's neck, he pulls sharp breaths through his nose, smelling him under his jaw. He lifts his head briefly to rub his cheek against Brian's and bite at Brian's skin, pinching enough to hurt, then he's ducking down again to lave his tongue over Brian's mark.

"Jesus—Dom—" 

"Where?" Dom mutters against Brian's skin. 

His fingers tighten in Brian's hair and he turns Brian's head at an uncomfortable angle, sets his teeth to the mark. Brian jerks in shock, the kick of it knocks the breath out of him as Dom tightens the clamp of the bite, it's a savage jolt to the nerves.

Their wolves meet and there's something almost violent in how Dom comes into his space. Brian's wolf whines and cringes back, sensing the intensity and purpose bleeding off of the alpha. He can't stop himself from growling as Dom advances—a wavering, unhappy sound. The fight with Lance is still too fresh in his mind, and instinct is taking over rationality.

They tussle, but it's over in seconds. The alpha snarls and Brian submits at once, goes limp onto his back and lets Dom have what he wants. 

Dom pins him firmly, like a grown wolf would pin a cub, and licks his neck, finds the wound on his shoulder and cleans it with obsessive care.

"Son of a bitch," Dom breathes. His wolf stays over Brian for a while longer and Dom stays leaning into Brian, crushing him against the wall with his bulky body. 

Both of their chests are heaving. Dom's breath comes shaky through his nose. He licks and sucks at Brian's mark, slower now, placating himself.

~*~


End file.
